Commercial Lines

Underwriting and risk-engineering experts give tips for insuring and securing vacant property, and also provide the insurance and risk definitions of “vacant” and “idle” properties.

Underwriting and risk-engineering experts give tips for insuring and securing vacant property, and also provide the insurance and risk definitions of “vacant” and “idle” properties.

In mid-June Allied World Assurance Co. Holdings AG and Transatlantic Holdings Inc. announced a $3.2 billion merger deal, creating a global specialty insurer and reinsurer operating in 18 countries and on six continents.

The soft market remains firmly entrenched on the casualty side of the reinsurance business. But the property and catastrophe marketplace is a much different—and more unsettled—story.

For the CEO of Crum & Forster, Doug Libby, who voluntarily describes himself as “a contrarian,” there is little not to like about the $294 million deal, closed in February, that adds First Mercury Financial Corp. to his group’s specialty-insurance operations.

The CEO of Fortegra Financial believes he has a distinct edge as he competes to acquire property and casualty wholesale brokerages and regional specialty agencies to add to his firm’s suite of insurance-service operations: Being a New York Stock Exchange-listed public company.